EvangelineA Tale of Acadie

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellowprinted from www.mainehistory.com

This is the forest primeval. The murmur- ing pines and the hemlocks,Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic,Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms.Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep- voiced neighboring oceanSpeaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.

This is the forest primeval; but where are the hearts that beneath itLeaped like the roe, when he hears in the woodland the voice of the hunts- man?Where is the thatch-roofed village, the home of Acadian farmers,--Men whose lives glided on like rivers that water the woodlands,Darkened by shadows of earth, but reflect- ing an image of heaven?Waste are those pleasant farms, and the farmers forever departed!Scattered like dust and leaves, when the mighty blasts of OctoberSeize them, and whirl them aloft, and sprinkle them far o’er the ocean.Naught but tradition remains of the beau- tiful village of Grand-Pre.

Ye who believe in affection that hopes, and endures, and is patient,Ye who believe in the beauty and strength of woman’s devotion,List to the mournful tradition, still sung by the pines of the forest;List to a Tale of Love in Acadie, home of the happy.

PART THE FIRSTI

In the Acadian land, on the shores of the Basin of Minas,Distant, secluded, still, the little village of Grand-PreLay in the fruitful valley. Vast meadows stretched to the eastward,Giving the village its name, and pasture to flocks without number.Dikes, that the hands of the farmers had raised with labor incessant,Shut out the turbulent tides; but at stated seasons the flood-gatesOpened, and welcomes the sea to wander at will o’er the meadows.West and south there were fields of flax, and orchards and cornfieldsSpreading afar and unfenced o’er the plain; and away to the northwardBlomindon rose, and the forests old, and aloft on the mountainsSea-fogs pitched their tents, and mists from the mighty AtlanticLooked on the happy valley, but ne’er from their station descended.There, in the midst of its farms, reposed the Acadian village.Strongly built were the houses, with frames of oak and of hemlock,Such as the peasants of Normandy built in the reign of the Henries.Thatched were the roofs, with dormer-win- dows; and gables projectingOver the basement below protected and shaded the doorway.There in the tranquil evenings of summer, when brightly the sunsetLighted the village street, and gilded the vanes on the chimneys,Matrons and maidens sat in snow-white

caps and in kirtlesScarlet and blue and green, with distaffs spinning the goldenFlax for the gossiping looms, whose noisy shuttles within doorsMingled their sounds with the whir of the wheels and the songs of the maidens.Solomnly down the street came the parish priest, and the childrenPaused in their play to kiss the hand he extended to bless them.Reverend walked he among them; and up rose matrons and maidens,Hailing his slow approach with words of affectionate welcome.Then came the laborers home from the field, and serenely the sun sankDown to his rest, and twilight prevailed. Anon from the belfrySoftly the Angelus sounded, and over the roofs of the villageColumns of pale blue smoke, like clouds of incense ascending.Rose from a hundred hearths, the homes of peace and contentment.Thus dwelt together in love these simple Acadian farmers,--Dwelt in the love of God and of man. Alike were they free fromFear, that reigns with the tyrant, and envy, the vice of republics.Neither locks had they to their doors, nor bars to their windows;But their dwellings were open as day and the hearts of the owners;There the richest was poor, and the poorest lived in abundance.

Somewhat apart from the village, and nearer the Basin of Minas,Benedict Bellefontaine, the wealthiest farmer of Grand-Pre,Dwelt on his goodly acres; and with him, directing his household,Gentle Evangeline lived, his child, and the pride of the village.

Stalworth and stately in form was the man of seventy winters;Hearty and hale was he, an oak that is covered with snow-flakes;White as the snow were his locks, and his cheeks as brown as the oak-leaves.Fair was she to behold, that maiden of seventeen summers.Black were her eyes as the berry that grows on the thorn by the wayside,Black, yet how softly they gleamed be- neath the brown shade of her tresses!Sweet was her breath as the brown of kine that feed in the meadows.When in the harvest heat she bore to the reapers at noontideFlagons of home-brewed ale, ah! fair in sooth was the maiden.Fairer was she when, on Sunday morn, while the bell from its turretSprinkled with holy sounds the air, as the priest with his hyssopSprinkles the congregation, and scatters blessings upon them,Down the long street she passed, with her chaplet of beads and her missal,Wearing her Norman cap, and her kirtle of blue, and the ear-rings,Brought in the olden time from France, and since, as an heirloom,Handed down from mother to child, through long generations.But a celestial brightness—a more ethe- real beauty—Shone on her face and encircled her form, when, after confession,Homeward serenely she walked with God’s benediction upon her.When she had passed, it seemed like the ceasing of exquisite music.

Firmly built with rafters of oak, the house of the farmerStood on the side of a hill commanding the sea; and a shadySycamore grew by the door, with a wood-

bine wreathing around it.Rudely carved was the porch, with seats beneath; and a footpathLed through an orchard wide, and disap- peared in the meadow.Under the sycamore-tree were hives over- hung by a penthouse,Such as the traveller sees in regions remote by the roadside,Built o’er a box for the poor, or the blessed image of Mary.Farther down, on the slope of the hill, was the well with its moss-grownBucket, fastened with iron, and near it a trough for the horses.Shielding the house from storms, on the north, were the barns and the farm- yard.There stood the broad wheeled wains and the antique ploughs and the har- rows;There were the folds for the sheep; and there, in his feathered seraglio,Strutted the lordly turkey, and crowed the cock, with the self-sameVoice that in ages of old had startled the penitent Peter.Bursting with hay were the barns, them- selves a village. In each oneFar o’er the gable projected a roof of thatch; and a staircase,Under the sheltering eaves, led up to the odorous corn-loft.There too the dove-cot stood, with its meek and innocent inmatesMurmuring ever of love; while above in the variant breezesNumberless noisy weathercocks rattled and sang of mutation.

Thus, at peace with God and the world, the farmer of Grand-PreLived on his sunny farm, and Evangeline governed his household.Many a youth, as he knelt in church and opened his missal,

Fixed his eyes upon her as the saint of his deepest devotion;Happy was he who might touch her hand or the hem of her garment!Many a suitor came to her door, by the darkness befriended,And, as he knocked and waited to hear the sound of her footsteps,Knew not which beat the louder, his heart or the knocker of iron;Or at the joyous feast of the Patron Saint of the village,Bolder grew, and pressed her hand in the dance as he whisperedHurried words of love, that seemed a part of the music.But, among all who came, young Gabriel only was welcome;Gabriel Lajeunesse, the son of Basil the blacksmith,Who was a mighty man in the village, and honored of all men;For, since the birth of time, throughout all ages and nations,Has the craft of the smith been held in repute by the people.Basil was Benedict’s friend. Their children from earliest childhoodGrew up together as brother and sister; and Father Felician,Priest and pedagogue both in the village, had taught them their lettersOut of the selfsame book, with the hymns of the church and the plain-song.But when the hymn was sung, and the daily lesson completed,Swiftly they hurried away to the forge of Basil the blacksmith.There at the door they stood, with wonder- ing eyes to behold himTake in his leathern lap the hoof of the horse as a plaything,Nailing the shoe in its place; while near him the tire of cart-wheelLay like a fiery snake, coiled round in a circle of cinders.

Oft on autumnal eves, when without in the gathering darknessBursting with light seemed the smithy, through every cranny and crevice,Warm by the forge within they watched the laboring bellows,And as its painting ceased, and the sparks expired in the ashes,Merrily laughed, and said they were nuns going into the chapel.Oft on sledges in winter, as swift as the swoop of the eagle,Down the hillside bounding, they glided away o’er the meadow.Oft in the barns thy climbed to the pou- lous nests on the rafters,Seeking with eager eyes that wondrous stone, which the swallowBrings from the shore of the sea to restore the sight of its fledglings;Lucky was he who found that stone in the nest of the swallow!Thus passed a few swift years, and they no longer were children.He was a valiant youth, and his face, like the face of the morning,Gladdened the earth with its light, and ripened thought into action.She was a woman now, with the heart and hopes of a woman.“Sunshine of Saint Eulalie” was she called; for that was the sunshineWhich, as the farmers believed, would load their orchards with apples;She, too, would bring to her husband’s house delight and abundance,Filling it with love and the ruddy faces of children.

IINow had the season returned, when the nights grow colder and longer,And the retreating sun the sign of the Scorpion enters.Birds of passage sailed through the leaden air, from the ice-bound,Desolate northern bays to the shores of

tropical islands.Harvests were gathered in; and wild with the winds of SeptemberWrestled the trees of the forest, as Jacob of old with the angel.All the signs foretold a winter long and inclement.Bees, with prophetic instinct of want, had hoarded their honeyTill the hives overflowed; and the Indian hunters assertedCold would the winter be, for thick was the fur of the foxes.Such was the advent of autumn. Then followed that beautiful season,Called by the pious Acadian peasants the Summer of All-Saints!Filled was the air with a dreamy and magi- cal light; and the landscapeLay as if new-created in all the freshness of childhood.Peace seemed to reign upon earth, and the restless heart of the oceanWas for a moment consoled. All sounds were in harmony blended.Voices of children at play, the crowing of cocks in the farm-yards.Whir of wings in the drowsy air, and the cooing of pigeons,All were subdued and low as the murmurs of love, and the great sunLooked with the eye of love through the golden vapors around him;While arrayed in his robes of russet and scarlet and yellow,Bright with the sheen of the dew, each glittering tree of the forestFlashed like the plane-tree the Persian adorned with mantles and jewels.

Now recommenced the reign of rest and affection and stillness.Day with its burden and heat had departed, and twilight descendingBrought back the evening star to the sky, and the herds to the home-

stead.Pawing the ground they came, and resting their necks on each other,And with their nostrils distended inhaling the freshness of evening.Foremost, bearing the bell, Evangeline’s beautiful heifer,Proud of her snow-white hide, and the ribbon that waved from her col- lar,Quietly paced and slow, as if conscious of human affection.Then came the shepherd back with his bleating flocks from the sea-side,Where was their favorite pasture. Behind them followed the watch-dog,Patient, full of importance, and grand in the pride of his instinct,Walking from side to side with a lordly air, and superblyWaving his bushy tail, and urging forward the stragglers;Regent of the flocks was he when the shepherd slept; their protector,When from the forest at night, through the starry silence the wolves howled.Late, with the rising moon, returned the wains from the marshes,Laden with briny hay, that filled the air with its odor.Cheerily neighed the steeds, with dew on their manes and their fetlocks,While aloft on their shoulders the wooden and ponderous saddles,Painted with brilliant dyes, and adorned with tassels of crimson,Nodded in bright array, like hollyhocks heavy with blossoms.Patiently stood the cows meanwhile, and yielded their uddersUnto the milkmaid’s hand; whilst loud and in regular cadenceInto the sounding pails the foaming stream- lets descended.Lowing of cattle and peals of laughter were heard in the farm-yard,

Echoed back to the barns. Anon they sank into stillness;Heavily closed with a jarring sound, the valves of the barn-doors,Rattled the wooden bars, and all for a sea- son was silent.

In-doors, warm by the wide-mouthed fireplace, idly the farmerSat in his elbow-chair and watched how the flames and the smoke-wreathesStruggled together like foes in a burning city. Behind him,Nodding and mocking along the wall, with gestures fantastic,Darted his own huge shadow, and vanished away into darkness.Faces, clumsily carved in oak, on the back of his arm-chairLaughed in the flickering light; and the pewter plates on the dresserCaught and reflected the flame, as shields of armies the sunshine.Fragments of song the old man sang, and carols of Christmas,Such as at home, in the olden time, his fathers before himSang in their Norman orchards and bright Burgundian vineyards.Close at her father’s side was the gentle Evangeline seated,Spinning flax for the loom, that stood in the corner behind her.Silent awhile were its treadles, at rest was its diligent shuttle,While monotonous drone of the wheel, like the drone of a bagpipe,Followed the old man’s song and united the fragments together.As in a church, when the chant of the choir at intervals ceases,Footfalls are heard in the aisles, or words of the priest at the altar,So, in each pause of the song, with meas- ured motion the clock clicked. Thus as they sat, there were footsteps

heard, and suddenly lifted,Sounded the wooden latch, and the door swung back on its hinges.Benedict knew by the hob-nailed shoes it was Basil the blacksmith,And by her beating heart Evangeline knew who was with him.“Welcome!” the farmer exclaimed, as their footsteps paused on the thresh- old,“Welcome, Basil my friend! Come, take thy place on the settleClose by the chimney-side, which is always empty without thee;Take from the shelf overhead thy pipe and the box of tobacco;Never so much thyself art thou as when through the curlingSmoke of the pipe or the forge thy friendly and jovial face gleamsRound and red as the harvest moon through the midst of the marshes.”Then, with a smile of content, thus an- swered Basil the blacksmith,Taking with easy air the accustomed seat by the fireside:--“Benedict Bellefontaine, thou hast ever thy jest and thy ballad!Ever in cheerfullest mood thou art, when others are filled withGloomy forebodings of ill, and see only ruin before them.Happy art thou, as if every day thou hadst picked up a horseshoe.”Pausing a moment, to take the pipe that Evangeline brought him,And with a coal from the embers had lighted, he slowly continued:--“Four days now are passed since the Eng- lish ships at their anchorsRide in the Gaspereau’s mouth, with their cannon pointed against us.What their design may be is unknown; but all are commandedOn the marrow to meet in the church, where his Majesty’s mandate

Will be proclaimed as law in the land. Alas! in the mean timeMany surmises of evil alarm the hearts of the people.”Then made answer the farmer: “Perhaps some friendlier purposeBrings these ships to our shores. Perhaps the harvests in EnglandBy untimely rains or untimelier heat have been blighted,And from our bustling barns they would feed their cattle and children.”“Not so thinketh the folk in the village,” said, warmly, the blacksmith,Shaking his head, as in doubt; then heav- ing a sigh he continued:--“Louisburg is not forgotten, nor Beau Sejour, nor Port Royal.Many have already fled to the forest, and lurk on its outskirts,Waiting with anxious hearts the dubious fate of to-morrow.Arms have been taken from us, and war- like weapons of all kinds;Nothing is left but the blacksmith’s sledge and the scythe of the mower.”Then with a pleasant smile made answer the jovial farmer:--“Safer are we unarmed, in the midst of our flocks and our cornfields,Safer within these peaceful dikes, besieged by the ocean,Than our fathers in forts, besieged by the enemy’s cannon.Fear no evil, my friend, and to-night may no shadow of sorrowFall on this house and hearth; for this is the night of the contract.Built are the house and the barn. The merry lads of the villageStrongly have built them and well; and, breaking the glebe round about them,Filled the barn with hay, and the house with food for a twelvemonth.Rene Leblanc will be here anon, with his

papers and inkhorn.Shall we not then be glad, and rejoice in the joy of our children?”As apart by the window she stood, with her hand in her lover’s ,Blushing Evangeline heard the words that her father had spoken,And, as they died on his lips, the worthy notary entered.

III

Bent like a laboring oar, that oils in the surf of the oceans,Bent, but not broken, by age was the form of the notary public;Shocks of yellow hair, like the silken floss of the maize, hungOver his shoulders; his forehead was high; and glasses with horn bowsSat astride on his nose, with a look of wisdom supernal.Father of twenty children was he, and more than a hundredChildren’s children rode on his knee, and heard his great watch tick.Four long years in the times of the war had he languished a captive,Suffering much in an old French fort as the friend of the English.Now, though warier grown, without all guile or suspicion,Ripe in wisdom was he, but patient, and simple, and childlike.He was beloved by all, and most of all by the children;For he told them tales of the Loup-garou in the forest,And of the goblin that came in the night to water the horses,And of the white Letiche, the ghost of a child who unchristenedDied, and was doomed to haunt unseen the chambers of children;And how on Christmas eve the oxen talked in the stable,

And how the fever was cured by a spider shut up in a nutshell,And of the marvelous powers of four- leaved clover and horseshoes,With whatsoever else was writ in the lore of the village.Then up rose form his seat by the fireside Basil the blacksmith,Knocked from his pipe the ashes, and slowly extended his right hand,“Father Leblanc, “ he exclaimed, “thou hast heard the talk in the village,And, perchance, canst tell us some news of these ships and their errand.”Then with modest demeanor made answer the notary public,--“Gossip enough have I heard, in sooth, yet am never the wiser;And what their errand may be I know not better than others.Yet am I not of those who imagine a some evil intentionBrings them here, for we are at peace; and why then molest us?”“God’s name!” shouted the hasty and somewhat irascible blacksmith;“Must we in all things look for the how, and the why, and the wherefore?Daily injustice is done, and might is the right of the strongest!”But without heeding his warmth, continued the notary public,--“Man is unjust, but God is just; and finally justiceTriumphs; and well I remember a story, that often consoled me,When as a captive I lay in the old French fort as Port Royal.”This was the old man’s favorite tale, and he loved to repeat it.When his neighbors complained that any injustice was done them.“Once in an ancient city, whose name I no longer remember,Raised aloft on a colomn, a brazen statue

of JusticeStood in the public square, upholding the scales in its left hand,And in its right a sword, as an emblem that justice presidedOver the laws of the land, and the hearts and homes of the people.Even the birds had built their nests in the scales of the balance,Having no fear of the sword that flashed in the sunshine above them.But in the course of time the laws of the land were corrupted;Might took the place of right, and the weak were oppressed, and the mightyRuled with an iron rod. Then it chanced in a nobleman’s palaceThat a necklace of pearl’s was lost, and erelong a suspicionFell on an orphan girl who lived as a maid in the household.She, after form of trial condemned to die on the scaffold,Patiently met her doom at the foot of the statue of Justice.As to her Father in heaven her innocent spirit ascended,Lo! o’er the city a tempest rose; and the bolts of the thunderSmote the statue of bronze, and hurled in wrath form its left handDown on the pavement below the clattering scales of the balance,And in the hollow thereof was found the nest of the magpie,Into whose clay-built walls the necklace of pearls was inwoven.”Silenced, but not convinced, when the story was ended, the blacksmithStood like a man who fain would speak, but findeth no language;All his thought were congealed into lines on his face, as the vaporsFreeze in fantastic shapes on the window- panes in the winter.Then Evangeline lighted the brazen lamp

on the table,Filled, till it overflowed, the pewter tankard with home-brewedNut-brown ale, that was famed for its strength in the village of Grand- Pre;While from his pocket the notary drew his papers and inkhorn,Wrote with a steady hand the date and the age of the parties,Naming the dower of the bride in flocks of sheep and in cattle.Orderly all things proceeded, and duly and well were completed,And the great seal of the law was set like a sun on the margin.Then from his leathered pouch the farmer threw on the tableThree times the old man’s fee in solid pieces of silver;And the notary rising, and blessing the bride and the bridegroom,Lifted aloft the tankard of ale and drank to their welfare.Wiping the foam from his lip, he solemnly bowed and departed,While in silence the others sat and mused by the fireside,Till Evangeline brought the draught-board out of its corner.Soon was the game begun. In friendly contention the old menLaughed at each lucky hit, or unsuccessful manoeuvre,Laughed when a man was crowned, or a breach was made in the king-row.Meanwhile apart, in the twilight gloom of a window’s embrasure,Sat the lovers, and whispered together, be- holding the moon riseOver the pallid sea, and the silvery mists of the meadows.Silently one by one, in the infinite meadows of heaven,Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me- nots of the angels.

Thus was the evening passed. Anon the bell from the belfryRang out the hour of nine. the village cur- few, and straightwayRose the guests and departed; and silence reigned in the household.Many a farewell word and sweet good- night on the door-stepLingered long in Evangeline’s heart, and filled it with gladness.Carefully then were covered the embers that glowed on the hearth-stone,And in the oaken stairs resounded the tread of the farmer.Soon with a soundless step the foot of Evangeline followed.Up the staircase moved a luminous space in the darkness,Lighted less by the lamp than the shining face of the maiden.Silent she passed the hall, and entered the door of her chamber.Simple that chamber was, with its curtains of white, and its clothes-pressAmple and high, on whose spacious shelves were carefully foldedLinen and woolen stuffs, by the hand of Evangeline woven.This was the precious dower she would bring to her husband in marriage,Better than flocks and herds, being proofs of her skill as a housewife.Soon she extinguished her lamp, for the mellow and radiant moonlightStreamed through the windows, and lighted the room, till the heart of the maidenSwelled and obeyed its power, like the tremulous tides of the ocean.Ah! she was fair, exceeding fair to behold, as she stood withNaked snow-white feet on the gleaming floor of her chamber!Little she dreamed that below, among the trees of the orchard,

Waited her lover and watched for the gleam of her lamp and her shadow.Yet were her thoughts of him, and at times a feeling of sadnessPassed o’er her soul, as the sailing shade of clouds in the moonlightFlitted across the floor and darkened the room for a moment.And, as she gazed from the window, she saw serenely the moon passForth from the folds of a cloud, and one star followed her footsteps,As out of Abraham’s tent young Ishmael wandered with Hagar!

IV

Pleasantly rose the next morn the sun on the village of Grand Pre.Pleasantly gleamed in the soft, sweet air the Basin of Minas,Where the ships, with their wavering shad- ows, were riding at anchor.Life had long been astir in the village, and clamorous laborKnocked with its hundred hands at the golden ages of the morning.Now from the country around, from the farms and neighboring hamlets,Came in their holiday dresses the blithe Acadian peasants.Many a glad good-morrow and jocund laugh from the young folkMade the bright air brighter, as up from the numerous meadows,Where no path could be seen but the track of wheels in the greensward,Group after group appeared, and joined, or passed on the highway.Long ere noon, in the village all sounds of labor were silenced.Thronged were the streets with people; and noisy groups at the house-doorsSat in the cheerful sun, and rejoiced and gossiped together.

Every house was an inn, where all were welcomed and feasted;For with this simple people, who lived like brothers together,All things were held in common, and what one had was another’s.Yet under Benedict’s roof hospitality seemed more abundant:For Evangeline stood among the guests of her father;Bright was her face with smiles, and words of welcome and gladnessFell from her beautiful lips, and blessed the cup as she gave it.

Under the open sky, in the odorous air of the orchard,Stript of its golden fruit, was spread the feast of betrothal.There in the shade of the porch were the priest and the notary seated;There good Benedict sat, and sturdy Basil the blacksmith.Not far withdrawn from these, by the cinder- press and the beehives,Michael the fiddler was placed, with the gayest of hearts and of waistcoats.Shadow and light from the leaves alter- nately played on his snow-whiteHair, as it waved in the wind; and the jolly face of the fiddlerGlowed like a living coal when the ashes are blown from the embers.Gayly the old man sang to the vibrant sound of his fiddle,Tous les Bourgeois de Chartres, and Le Carillon du Dunquerque,And anon with his wooden shoes beat time to the music.Merrily, merrily whirled the wheels of the dizzying dancesUnder the orchard-trees and down the path to the meadows;Old folk and young together, and children mingled among them.

Fairest of all the maids was Evangeline, Benedict’s daughter!Noblest of all the youths was Gabriel, son of the blacksmith!

So passed the morning away. And lo! with a summons sonorousSounded the bell from its tower, and over the meadows a drum beat.Thronged erelong was the church with men. Without, in the church yard,Waited the women. They stood by the graves, and hung on the headstonesGarlands of autumn-leaves and evergreens fresh from the forest.Then came the guard from the ships, and marching proudly among themEntered the sacred portal. With loud and dissonant clangorEchoed the sound of their brazen drums from ceiling and casement,--Echoed a moment only, and slowly the ponderous portalClosed, and in silence the crown awaited the will of the soldiers.Then uprose their commander, and spake from the steps of the altar,Holding aloft in his hands, with its seals, the royal commission.“You are convened this day,” he said, “by his Majesty’s orders.Clement and kind he has been; but how you have answered his kindness,Let your own hearts reply! To my nat- ural make and my temperPainful the task is I do, which to you I know must be grievous.Yet must I bow and obey, and deliver the will of our monarch;Namely, that all your lands, and dwellings, and cattle of all kindsForfeited be to the crown; and that you yourselves from this provinceBe transported to other lands. God grant you may dwell there

Ever as faithful subjects, a happy and peaceable people!Prisoners now I declare you; for such is his Majesty’s pleasure!”As, when the air is serene in sultry solstice of summer,Suddenly gathers a storm, and the deadly sling of the hailstonesBeats down the farmer’s corn in the field and shatters his windows,Hiding the sun, and strewing the ground with thatch form the house-roofs,Bellowing fly the herds, and seek to break their enclosures;So on the hearts of the people descended the words of the speaker.Silent a moment they stood in speechless wonder, and then roseLouder and even louder a wail of sorrow and anger,And, by one impulse moved, they madly rushed to the door-way.Vain was the hope of escape; and cries and fierce imprecationsRang through the house of prayer; and high o’er the heads of the oth- ersRose, with this arms uplifted, the figure of Basil the blacksmith,As, on a stormy sea, a spar is tossed by the billows.Flushed was his face and distorted with passion; and wildly he shouted,--“Down with the tyrants of England! we never have sworn them allegiance!Death to those foreign soldiers, who seize on our homes and our harvests!”More he fain would have said, but the merciless hand of the soldierSmote him upon the mouth, and dragged him down to the pavement.

In the midst of the strife and tumult of angry contention,Lo! the door of the chancel opened, and Father Felician

Entered, with serious mien, and ascended the steps of the altar.Raising his reverend hand, with a gesture he awed into silenceAll that clamorous throng; and thus he spake to his people;Deep were his tones and solemn; in accents measured and mournfulSpake he, as, after the tocsin’s alarum, dis- tinctly the clock strikes.“What is this that ye do, my children? what madness has seized you?Forty years pf my life have I labored among you, and taught you,Not in word alone, but in deed, to love one another!Is this the fruit of my toils, of my vigils and prayers and privations?Have you so soon forgotten all lessons of love and forgiveness?This is the house of the Prince of Peace, and would you profane itThus with violent deeds and hearts over- flowing with hatred?Lo! where the crucified Christ form his cross is gazing upon you!See! in those sorrowful eyes what meek- ness and holy compassion!Hark! how those lips still repeat the prayer, ‘O Father, forgive them!’Let us repeat it now, and say, ‘O Father, forgive them!’”Few were his words of rebuke, but deep in the hearts of his peopleSank they, and sobs of contrition succeeded the passionate outbreak,While they repeated his prayer, and said, “O Father, forgive them!”

Then came the evening service. The tapers gleamed from the altar.Fervent and deep was the voice of the priest, and the people responded,Not with their lips alone, but their hearts; and the Ave MariaSang they, and fell on their knees, and

their souls, with devotion translated,Rose on the ardor of prayer, like Elijah ascending to heaven.

Meanwhile had spread in the village the tidings of ill, and on all sidesWandered, wailing, from house to house the woman and children.Long at her father’s door Evangeline stood, with her right handShielding her eyes from the level rays of the sun, that descending,Lighted the village street with mysterious spleandor, and roofed eachPeasant’s cottage with golden thatch, and emblazoned its windows.Long within had been spread the snow- white cloth on the table;There stood the wheaten loaf, and the honey fragrant with wild-flowers;There stood the tankard of ale, and the cheese fresh brought from the dairy,And, at the head of the board, the great arm-chair of the farmer.Thus did Evangeline wait at her father’s door, as the sunsetThrew the long shadows of trees o’er the broad ambrosial meadows.Ah! on her spirit within a deeper shadow had fallen,And from the fields of her soul a fragrance celestial ascended,--Charity, meekness, love, and hope, and forgiveness and patience!Then, all-forgetful of self, she wandered into the village,Cheering with looks and words the mourn- ful hearts of the women,As o’er the darkening fields with lingering steps they departed,Urged by their household cares, and the weary feet of their children.Down sank the great red sun, and in golden, glimmering vapors

Veiled the light of his face, like the Prophet descending from Sinai.Sweetly over the village the bell of the Angelus sounded.

Meanwhile, amid the gloom, by the church Evangeline lingered.All was silent within; and in vain at the door and the windowsStood she, and listened and looked, till, overcome by emotion,“Gabriel!” cried she aloud with tremulous voice; but no answerCame from the graves of the dead, nor the gloomier grave of the living.Slowly at length she retuned to the tenant- less house of her father.Smouldered the fire on the hearth, on the board was the supper untasted,Empty and drear was each room, and haunted with phantoms of terror.Sadly echoed her step on the stair and the floor of her chamber.In the dead of the night she heard the dis- consolate rain fallLoud on the withered leaves of the syca- more-tree by the window.Keenly the lightening flashed; and the voice of the echoing thunderTold her that God was in heaven, and gov- erned the world he created!Then she remembered the tale she had heard of the justice of Heaven;Soothed was her troubled soul, and she peacefully slumbered till morning.

V

Four times the sun had risen and set; and now on the fifth dayCheerily called the cock to the sleeping maids of the farm-house.Soon o’er the yellow fields, in silent and mournful procession,Came from the neighboring hamlets and

farms the Acadian women,Driving in ponderous wains their house- hold goods to the sea-shore,Pausing and looking back to gaze once more on their dwelling,Ere they were shut from sight by the winding road and the woodland.Close at their sides their children ran, and urged on the oxen,While in their hands they clasped some fragments of playthings.

Thus to the Gaspereau’s mouth they hur- ried; and there on the sea-beachPiled in confusion lay the household goods of the peasants.All day long between the shore and the ships did the boats ply;All day long the wains came laboring down from the village.Late in the afternoon, when the sun was near to his setting,Echoed far o’er the fields came the roll of drums from the church yard.Thither the women and children thronged. On a sudden the church-doorsOpened, and forth came the guard, and marching in gloomy processionFollowed the long imprisoned, but patient, Acadian farmers,Even as pilgrims, who journey afar from their homes and their country,Sing as they go, and in singing forget they are weary and wayworn,So with songs on their lips the Acadian peasants descendedDown from the church to the shore, amid their wives and their daughters.Foremost the young men came; and, raising together their voices,Sang with tremulous lips a chant of the Catholic Missions:--“Sacred heart of the Saviour! O inex- haustible fountain!Fill our hearts this day with strength and submission and patience!”

Then the old men, as they marched, and the women that stood by the way- sideJoined in the sacred psalm, and the birds in the sunshine above themMingled their notes therewith, like voices of spirits departed.

Half-way down to the shore Evangeline waited in silence,Not overcome with grief, but strong in the hour of affliction,--Calmly and sadly she waited, until the pro- cession approached her,And she beheld the face of Gabriel pale with emotion.Tears filled her eyes, and, eagerly run- ning to meet him,Clasped she his hands, and laid her head on his shoulder, and whispered,--“Gabriel! be of good cheer! for if we love one anotherNothing, in truth, can harm us, whatever mischances may happen!”Smiling she spake these words; then sud- denly paused, for her fatherSaw she slowly advancing. Alas! how changed was his aspect!Gone was the glow from his cheek, and the fire from his eye, and his footstepHeavier seemed with the weight of the heavy heart in his bosom.But with a smile and a sigh, she clasped his neck and embraced him,Speaking words of endearment where words of comfort availed not.Thus to the Gaspereau’s mouth moved on that mournful procession.

There disorder prevailed, and the tumult and stir of embarking.Busily plied the freighted boats; and in the confusionWives were torn from their husbands, and mothers, too late saw their children

Left on the land, extending their arms, with wildest entreaties.So unto separate ships were Basil and Gabriel carried,While in despair on the shore Evangeline stood with her father.Half the task was not done when the sun went down, and the twilightDeepened and darkened around; and in haste the refluent oceanFled away from the shore, and left the line of the sand-beachCovered with waifs of the tide, with kelp and the slippery sea-weed.Farther back in the midst of the household goods and the wagons,Like to a gypsy camp, or a leaguer after a battle,All escape cut off by the sea, and the senti- nels near them,Lay encamped for the night the houseless Acadian farmers.Back to its northernmost caves retreated the bellowing ocean,Dragging adown the beach the rattling pebbles, and leavingInland and far up the shore the stranded boats of the sailors.Then, as the night descended, the herds returned from their pastures;Sweet was the moist still air with the odor of milk form their utters;Lowing they waited, and long, at the well- known bars of the farm-yard,--Waited and looked in vain for the voice and the hand of the milk-maid.Silence reigned in the streets; from the church no Angelus sounded,Rose no smoke from the roofs, and gleamed no lights from the windows.

But on the shores meanwhile the even- ing fires had been kindled,Built of the drift-wood thrown on the sands from wrecks in the tempest.Round them shapes of gloom and sorrowful

faces were gathered,Voices of women were heard, and of men, and the crying of children.Onward from fire to fire, as from hearth to hearth in his parish,Wandered the faithful priest, consoling and blessing and cheering,Like unto shipwrecked Paul on Melita’s desolate sea-shore.Thus he approached the place where Evan- geline sat with her father,And in the flickering light beheld the fate of the old man,Haggard and hollow and wan, and without either thought or emotion,E’en as the face of a clock from which the hands have been taken.Vainly Evangeline strove with words and caresses to cheer him,Vainly offered him food; yet he moved not, he looked not, he spake not,But with a vacant stare, ever gazed at the flickering fire-light.“Benedicite!” murmured the priest, in tones of compassion.More he fain would have said, but his heart was full, and his accentsFaltered and paused on his lips, as the feet of a child on a threshold,Hushed by the scene he beholds, and the awful presence of sorrow.Silently, therefore he laid his hand on the head of the maiden,Raising his tearful eyes to the silent stars that above themMoved on their way, unperturbed by the wrongs and sorrows of mortals.Then he sat down at her side, and they wept together in silence.

Suddenly rose from the south a light, as in autumn the blood-redMoon climbs the crystal walls of heaven, and o’er the horizonTitan-like stretched its hundred hands upon the mountain and meadow,

Seizing the rocks and the rivers, and piling huge shadows together.Broader and even broader it gleamed on the roof of the village,Gleamed on the sky and sea, and the ships that lay in the roadstead.Columns of shining smoke uprose, and flashes of flame wereThrust through their folds and withdrawn, like the quivering hands of a martyr.Then as the wind seized the gleeds and the burning thatch, and, uplifting,Whirled them aloft through the air, at once from a hundred house-topsStarted the sheeted smoke with flashed of flame intermingled.

These things beheld in dismay the crown on the shore and on shipboard.Speechless at first they stood, then cried aloud in their anguish,“We shall behold no more our homes in the village of Grand-Pre!”Loud on a sudden the cocks began to crow in the farm-yards,Thinking the day had dawned; and anon the lowing of cattleCame on the evening breeze, by the bark- ing of dogs interrupted.Then rose a sound of dread, such as startles the sleeping encampmentsFar in the western prairies or forests that skirt the Nebraska,When the wild horses affrighted sweep by with the speed of the whirlwind,Or the loud bellowing herds of buffaloes rush to the river.Such was the sound that arose on the night, as the herds and the horsesBroke through their folds and fences, and madly rushed o’er the meadows.

Overwhelmed with the sight, yet speech- less, the priest and the maidenGazed on the scene of terror that reddened and widened before them;

And as they turned at length to speak to their silent companion,Lo! from his seat he had fallen, and stretched abroad on the sea-shoreMotionless lay his form, from which the soul had departed.Slowly the priest uplifted the lifeless head, and the maidenKnelt at her father’s side, and wailed aloud in her terror.Then in a swoon she sank, and lay with her head on his bosom.Through the long night she lay in deep, ob- livious slumber;And when she awoke from the trance, she beheld a multitude near her.Faces of friends she beheld, that were mournfully gazing upon her,Pallid, with tearful eyes, and looks of sad- dest compassion.Still the blaze of the burning village illu- mined the landscape,Reddened the sky overhead, and gleamed on the faces around her,And like the day of doom it seemed to her wavering senses.Then a familiar voice she heard, as it said to the people,--“Let us bury him here by the sea. When a happier seasonBrings us again to our homes from the un- known land of our exile,Then shall his sacred dust be piously laid in the church-yard.”Such were the words of the priest. And there in haste by the sea-side,Having the glare of the burning village for funeral torches,But without bell or book, they buried the farmer of Grand-Pre.And as the voice of the priest repeated the service of sorrow,Lo! with a mournful sound, like the voice of a vast congregation,Solemnly answered the sea, and mingled its roar with the dirges.

‘T was the returning tide, that afar from the waste of the ocean,With the first dawn of the day, came heav- ing and hurrying landward.Then recommended once more the stir and noise of embarking;And with the ebb of the tide the ships sailed out of the harbor,Leaving behind them the dead on the shore, and the village in ruins.

Part the SecondI.

Many a weary year had passed since the burning of Grand-Pre,When on the falling tide the freighted ves- sels departed,Bearing a nation, with all its household gods, into exile,Exile without an end, and without an ex- ample in story.Far asunder, on separate coasts, the Aca- dians landed;Scattered were they, like flakes of snow, when the wind from the north- eastStrikes aslant through the fogs that darken the Banks of Newfoundland.Friendless, homeless, hopeless, they wan- dered from city to city,From the cold lakes of the North, to sultry Southern savannas,--From the bleak shores of the sea to the lands where the Father of WatersSeizes the hills in his hands, and drags them down to the ocean,Deep in their sands to bury the scattered bones of the mammoth.Friends they sought and homes; and many, despairing, heart-broken,Asked of the earth but a grave, and no longer a friend nor a fireside.Written their history stands on tablets of stone in the churchyards.Long among them was seen a maiden who

waited and wandered,Lowly and meek in spirit, and patiently suffering al things.Fair was she and young: but, alas! before her extended,Dreary and vast and silent, the desert of life, with its pathwayMarked by the graves of those who had sorrowed and suffered before her,Passions long extinguished, and hopes long dead and abandoned,As the emigrant’s way o’er the Western desert is marked byCamp-fires long consumed, and bones that bleach in the sunshine.Something there was in her life incomplete, imperfect, unfinished;As if a morning of June, with all its music and sunshine,Suddenly paused in the sky, and fading, slowly descendedInto the east again, from whence it late had arisen.Sometimes she lingered in towns, till, urged by the fever within her,Urged by a restless longing, the hunger and thirst of the spirit,She would commence again her endless search and endeavor;Sometimes in churchyards strayed, and gazed on the crosses and tomb- stones,Sat by some nameless grave, and thought that perhaps in its bosomHe was already at rest, and she longed to slumber beside him.Sometimes a rumor, a hearsay, an inartic- ulate whisper,Came with its airy hand to point and beckon her forward.Sometimes she spake with those who had seen her beloved and known him,But in was long ago, in some far-off place or forgotten.“Gabriel Lajeunesse!” they said; “Oh yes! we have seen him.

He was with Basil the blacksmith, and both have gone to the prairies;Coureurs-des-Bois are they, and famous hunters and trappers.”“Gabriel Lajeunesse!” said others; “Oh yes! we have seen him.He is a voyageur in the lowlands of Louisiana.”Then they would say, “Dear child! why dream and wait for him longer?Are there not other youths as fair as Gabriel? othersWho have hearts as tender and true, and sprits as loyal?Here is Baptiste Leblanc, the notary’s son, who has loved theeMany a tedious year; come, give him thy hand and be happy!Thou art too fair to be left to braid St. Catherine’s tresses.”Then would Evangeline answer, serenely but sadly, “I cannot!Whither my heart has gone, there follows my hand, and not elsewhere.For when the heart goes before, like a lamp, and illuminates the pathway,Many things are made clear, and else lie hidden in darkness.”Thereupon the priest, her friends and father- confessor,Said, with a smile!, “O daughter! thy God thus speakith within thee!Talk not of wasted affection, affection never was wasted;If it enrich not the heart of another, its waters, returningBack to their spring, like the rain, shall fill them full of refreshment;That which the fountain sends forth returns again to the fountain.Patience; accomplish thy labor; accom- plish thy work of affection!Sorrow and silence are strong, and patient endurance is godlike,Therefore accomplish they labor of love, tillthe heart is made godlike,

Purified, strengthened, perfected, and ren- dered more worthy of heaven!”Cheered by the good man’s words, Evange- line labored and waited.Still in her heart she heard the funeral dirge of the ocean,But with its sound there was mingled a voice that whispered, “Despair not!”Thus did that poor soul wander in want and cheerless discomfort,Bleeding, barefooted, over the shards and thorns of existence.Let me essay, O Muse! to follow the wan- derer’s footsteps;--Not through each devious path, each changeful year of existence,But as a traveler follows a streamlet’s course through the valley:Far from its margin at times, and seeing the gleam of its waterHere and there, in some open space, and at intervals only;Then drawing nearer its banks, through sylvan glooms that conceal it,Though he behold it not, he can hear its continuous murmur;Happy, at length, if he find the spot where it reaches an outlet.

II.

It was the month of May. Far down the Beautiful River,Past the Ohio shore and past the mouth of the Wabash,Into the golden stream of the broad and swift Mississippi,Floated a cumbrous boat, that was rowed by Acadian boatmen.It was a band of exiles: a raft, as it were, from the shipwreckedNation, scattered along the coast, now floating together,Bound by the bonds of a common belief and a common misfortune;

Men and women and children, who, guided by hope or by hearsay,Sought for their kith and their kin among the few-acred farmersOn the Acadian coast, and the prairies of fair Opelousas.With them Evangeline went, and her guide,the Father Felician.Onward o’er sunken sands, through a wil- derness somber with forests,Day after day they glided adown the turbu- lent river;Night after night, by the blazing fires, encamped on its borders.Now through rusting chutes, among green islands, where plumelikeCotton-trees nodded their shadowy crests, they swept with the current,Then emerged into broad lagoons, where silvery sand-barsLay in the stream, and along the wimpling waves of their margin,Shining with snow-white plumes, large flocks of pelicans waded.Level the landscape grew, and along the shores of the river,Shaded by china-trees, in the midst of lux- uriant gardens,Stood the houses of planters, with negro- cabins and dove-cots.They were approaching the region where reigns perpetual summer,Where through the Golden Coast, and groves of orange and citron,Sweeps with majestic curve the river away to the eastward.They, too, swerved from their course; and, entering the Bayou of Plaque- mine,Soon were lost in a maze of sluggish and devious waters,Which, like a network of steel, extended in every direction.Over their heads the towering and tene- brous boughs of the cypressMet in a dusky arch, and trailing mosses

in mid-airWaved like banners that hang on the walls of ancient cathedrals.Deathlike the silence seemed, and unbroken, save by the heronsHome to their roosts in their cedar-trees re- turning at sunset,Or by the owl, as he greeted the moon with demoniac laughter.Lovely the moonlight was as it glanced and gleamed on the water,Gleamed on the columns of cypress and cedar sustaining the arches,Down through whose broken vaults it fell as through chinks in a ruin.Dreamlike, and indistinct, and strange were all things around them;And o’er their spirits there came a feeling of wonder and sadness, --Strange forebodings of ill, unseen and that cannot be compassed.As, at the tramp of a horse’s hoof on the turf of the prairies,Far in advance are closed the leaves of the shrinking mimosa,So, at the hoof-beats of fate, with sad fore- bodings of evil,Shrinks and closes the heart, ere the stroke of doom has attained it.But, Evangeline’s heart was sustained by a vision, that faintlyFloated before her eyes, and beckoned her on through the moonlight.It was the thought of her brain that as- sumed the shape of a phantom.Through those shadowy aisles had Gabriel wandered before her,And every stroke of the oar now brought him nearer and nearer.

Then in his place, the prow of the boat, rose one of the oarsmen,And, as a signal sound, if other like them peradventureSailed on those gloomy and midnight streams, blew a blast on his bugle.

Wild through the dark colonnades and cor- ridors leafy the blast rang,Breaking the seal of silence, and giving tongues to the forest.Soundless above them the banners of moss just stirred to the music.Multitudinous echoes awoke and died in the distance,Over the watery floor, and beneath the re- verberant branches;But not a voice replied; no answer came from the darkness;And, when the echoes had ceased, like a sense of pain was the silence.Then Evangeline slept; but the boatmen rowed through the midnight,Silent at times, then singing familiar Cana- dian boat-songs,Such as they sang of old in their own Aca- dian rivers,While through the night were heard the mysterious sounds of the desert,Far off, --indistinct,--as of wave or wind in the forest,Mixed with the whoop of the crane and the roar of the grim alligator.

Thus ere another noon they emerged from the shades; and before themLay in the golden sun, the lakes of the Atchafalaya.Water-lilies in myriads rocked on the slight undulationsMade by the passing oars, and, resplendent in beauty, the lotusLifted her golden crown above the heads of the boatmen.Faint was the air with the odorous breath ofmagnolia blossoms,And with the heat of noon; and numberless sylvanislands,Fragrant and thickly embowered with blossominghedges of roses,

Faint was the air with the odorous breath of magnolia blossoms,And with the heat of noon; and number- less sylvan islands,Fragrant and thickly embowered with blos- soming hedges of roses,Near to whose shores they glided along, invited to slumber.Soon by the fairest of these their weary oars were suspended.Under the boughs of Wachita willows, that grew by the margin,Safely their boat was moored; and scat- tered about on the greensward,Tired with their midnight toil, the weary travellers slumbered.Over them vast and high extended the cope of a cedar.Swinging from its great arms, the trumpet- flower and the grapevineHung their ladder of ropes aloft like the ladder of Jacob,On whose pendulous stairs the angels ascending, descending,Were the swift humming-birds, that flitted from blossom to blossom.Such was the vision Evangeline saw as she slumbered beneath it.Filled was her heart with love, and the dawn of an opening heavenLighted her soul in sleep with the glory of religions celestial.

Nearer, and even nearer among the numberless islands,Darted a light, swift boat, that sped away o’er the water,

Northward its prow was turned, to the land of thebison and beaver.At the helm sat a youth, with countenancethoughtful and careworn.Dark and neglected locks overshadowed hisbrow, and a sadnessSomewhat beyond his years on his face waslegibly written.

Near to theose legibly written.

Urged on its course by the sinewy arms of hunters and trappers.Northward its prow was turned, to the land of the bison and beaver.At the helm sat a youth, with countenance thoughtful and careworn.Dark and neglected locks overshadowed his brow, and a sadnessSomewhat beyond his years on his face was legibly written.Gabriel was it, who, weary with waiting, unhappy and restless,Sought in the Western wilds oblivion of self and of sorrow.Swiftly they glided along, close under the lee of the island,But by the opposite bank, and behind a screen of palmettos,So that they saw not the boat, where it lay concealed in the willows;All undisturbed by the dash of their oars, and unseen, were the sleepers.Angel of God was there none to awaken the slumbering maiden.Swiftly they glided away, like the shade of a cloud on the prairie.After the sound of their oars on the tholes had died in the distance,As from a magic trance the sleepers awoke, and the maidenSaid with a sigh to the friendly priest, “O Father Felician!Something says in my heart that near me Gabriel wanders.Is it a foolish dream, an idle and vague superstition?Or has an angel passed, and revealed the truth to my spirit?”Then, with a blush, she added, “Alas for my credulous fancy!Unto ears like thine such words as these have no meaning.”But made answer the reverend man, and

he smiled as he answered,--“Daughter, thy words are not idle; nor are they to me without meaning.Feeling is deep and still; and the word that floats on the surfaceIs as the tossing buoy, that betrays where the anchor is hidden.Therefore trust to thy heart, and to what the world calls illusions.Gabriel truly is near thee; for not far away to the southward,On the banks of the Teche, are the towns of St. Maur and St. Martin.There the long-wandering bride shall be given again her bridegroom,There the long-absent pastor regain his flock and his sheepfold.Beautiful is the land, with its prairies and forests of fruit-trees;Under the feet a garden of flowers, and the bluest of heavensBending above, and resting its dome on the walls of the forest.They who dwell there have named it the Eden of Louisiana!”

With these words of cheer they arose and continued their journey.Softly the evening came. The sun from the western horizonLike a magician extended his golden wand o’er the landscape;Twinkling vapors arose; and sky and water and forestSeemed all on fire at the touch, and melted and mingled together.Hanging between two skies, a cloud with edges of silver,Floated the boat, with its dripping oars, on the motionless water.Filled was Evangeline’s heart with inex- pressible sweetness.

Touched by the magic spell, the sacred fountains of feelingGlowed with the light of love, as the skies and waters around her.Then from a neighboring thicket the mock- ing-bird, wildest of singers,Swinging aloft on a willow spray that hung o’er the water,Shook from his little throat such floods of delirious music,That the whole air and the woods and the waves seemed silent to listen.Plaintive at first were the tones and sad: then soaring to madnessSeemed they to follow or guide the revel of frenzied Bacchantes.Single notes were then heard, in sorrowful, low lamentation;Till, having gathered them all, he flung them abroad in derision,As when, after a storm, a gust of wind through the tree-topsShakes down the rattling rain in a crystal shower on the branches.With such a prelude as this, and hearts that throbbed with emotion,Slowly they entered the Teche, where it flows through the green Opelousas,And, through the amber air, above the crest of the woodland,Saw the column of smoke that arose from a neighboring dwelling;--Sounds of a horn they heard, and the dis- tant lowing of cattle.

III.Near to the bank of the river, o’ershad- owed by oaks, from whose branchesGarlands of Spanish moss and of mystic mistletoe flaunted,Such as the Druids cut down with golden hatchets at Yule-tide,Stood, secluded and still, the house of the herdmen. A gardenGirded it round about with a belt of luxury-

ant blossoms,Filling the air with fragrance. The house itself was of timbersHewn from the cypress-tree, and carefully fitted together.Large and low was the roof; and on slender columns supported,Rose-wreathed, vine-encircled, a broad and spacious veranda,Haunt of the humming-bird and the bee, extended around it.At each end of the house, amid the flowers of the garden,Stationed the dove-cots were, as love’s per- petual symbol,Scenes of endless wooing, and endless con- tentions of rivals.Silence reigned o’er the place. The line of shadow and sunshineRan near the tops of the trees; but the house itself was in shadow,And from its chimney-top, ascending and slowly expandingInto the evening air, a think blue column of smoke rose.In the read of the house, form the garden gate, ran a pathwayThrough the great groves of oak to the skirts of the limitless prairie,Into whose sea of flowers the sun was slowly descending.Full in his track of light, like ships with shadowy canvasHanging loose from their spars in a motion- less calm in the tropics,Stood a cluster of trees, with tangled cord- age of grape-vines.

Just where the woodlands met the flowery surf of the prairie,Mounted upon his horse, with Spanish sad- dle and stirrups,Sat a herdsman, arrayed in gaiters and doublet of deerskin,

Broad and brown was the face that from under the Spanish sombreroGazed on the peaceful scene, with the lordly look of its master.Round about him were numberless herds of kine, that were grazingQuietly in the meadows, and breathing the vapory freshnessThat uprose from the river, and spread itself over the landscape.Slowly lifting the horn that hung at his side, and expandingFully his broad, deep chest, he blew a blast, that resoundedWildly and sweet and far, through the still damp air of the evening.Suddenly out of the grass the long white horns of the cattleRose like flakes of foam on the adverse cur- rents of ocean.Silent a moment they grazed, then bellow- ing rushed o’er the prairie,And the whole mass became a cloud, a shade in the distance.Then, as the herdsman turned to the house, through the gate of the gar- denSaw he the forms of the priest and the maiden advancing to meet him.Suddenly down from his horse he sprang in amazement, and forwardRushed with extended arms and exclama- tions of wonder;When they beheld his face, they recognized Basil the blacksmith.Hearty his welcome was, as he led his guests to the garden.There in an arbor of roses with endless questions and answerGave they vent to their hearts, and renewed their friendly embraces,Laughing and weeping by turns, or sitting silent and thoughtful.Thoughtful, for Gabriel came not; and now dark doubts and misgivingsStole o’er the maiden’s heart; and Basil,

somwhat embarrassed ,Broke the silence and said, “If you came by the Atchafalaya,How have you nowhere encountered my Gabriel’s boat on the bayous?”Over Evangeline’s face at the words of Basil a shadow passed.Tears came into her eyes, and she said, with a tremulous accent,“Gone? is Gabriel gone?” and, conceal- ing her face on his shoulder,All her o’erburdened heart gave way, and she wept and lamented.Then the good Basil said, -- and his voice grew blithe as he said it,--“Be of good cheer, my child; it is only to- day he departed.Foolish boy! he has left me alone with my herds and my horses.Moody and restless grown, and tried and troubled, his spiritCould no longer endure the calm of this quiet existence,Thinking ever of thee, uncertain and sor- rowful ever,Ever silent, or speaking only of thee and his troubles,He at length had become so tedious to men and to maidens,Tedious even to me, that at length I be- thought me, and sent himUnto the towns of Adayes to trade for mules with the Spaniards.Thence he will follow the Indian trails to the Ozark Mountains,Hunting for furs in the forest, on rivers trapping the beaver.Therefore be of good cheer; we will follow the fugitive lover;He is not far on his way, an the Fates and the streams are against him.Up and away to-morrow, and through the red dew of the morningWe will follow him fast, and bring him back to his prison.”

Then glad voices were heard, and up from the banks of the river,Borne aloft on his comrades’ arms, came Michael the fiddler.Long under Basil’s roof had he lived like a god on Olympus,Having no other care than dispensing music to mortals.Far renowned was he for his silver locks and his fiddle.“Long live Michael,” they cried, “our brave Acadian minstrel!”As they bore him aloft in triumphal pro- cession; and straightwayFather Felician advanced with Evangeline, greeting the old manKindly and oft, and recalling the past, while Basil, enraptured,Hailed with hilarious joy his old campan- ions and gossips,Laughing loud and long, and embracing mothers and daughters.Much they marveled to see the wealth of the ci-devant blacksmith,All his domains and his herds, and his pa- triarchal demeanor;Much they marveled to hear his tales of the soil and the climate,And of the prairies, whose numberless herds were his who would take them;Each one thought in his heart, that he, too, would go and do likewise.Thus they ascended the steps, and crossing the breezy veranda,Entered the hall of the house, where al- ready the supper of BasilWaited his return; and they rested and feasted together.

Over the joyous feast the sudden dark- ness descended.All was silent without, and, illuminating the landscape with silver,Fair rose the dewy moon and the myriad stars; but within doors,Brighter than these, shone the faces of

friends in the glimmering lamp- light.Then from his station aloft, at the head of the table, the herdsmanPoured forth hid heart and his wine to- gether in endless profusion.Lighting his pipe, that was filled with sweet Natchitoches tobacco,Thus he spake to his guests, who listened, and smiled as they listened:--“Welcome once more, my friends, who long have been friendless and home- less,Welcome once more to a home, that is better perchance than the old one!Here no hungry winter congeals our blood like the rivers;Here no stony ground provokes the wrath of the farmer.Smoothly the ploughshare runs through the soil, as a keel through the wa- ter.All the year round the orange-groves are in blossom; and grass growsMore in a single night than a whole Cana- dian summer.Here, too, numberless herds run wild and unclaimed in the prairies;Here, too, lands may be had for the asking, and forests of timberWith a few blows of the axe are hewn and framed into houses.After your houses are built, and your fields are yellow with harvests,No King George of England shall drive you away from your homesteads,Burning your dwellings and barns, and stealing your farms and your cattle.”Speaking those words, he blew a wrathful cloud from his nostrils,While his huge, brown hand came thunder- ing down on the table,So that the guests all started; and Father Felician, astounded,Suddenly paused, with a pinch of snuff

half-way to his nostrils.But the brave Basil resumed, and his words were milder and gayer:--“Only beware of the fever, my friends, beware of the fever!For it is not like that of our cold Acadian climate,Cured by wearing a spider hung round one’s neck in a nutshell!”Then there were voices heard at the door, and footsteps approachingSounded upon the stairs and the floor of the breezy veranda.It was the neighboring Creoles and small Acadian planters,Who had been summoned all to the house of Basil the Herdsman.Merry the meeting was of ancient com- rades and neighbors.Friend clasped friend in his arms; and they who before were as strangers,Meeting in exile, became straightway as friends to each others,Drawn by the gentle bond of a common country together.But in the neighboring hall a strain of music, proceedingFrom the accordant strings of Michael’s melodious fiddle,Broke up all further speech. Away, like children delighted,All things forgotten beside, they gave themselves to the maddeningWhirl of the giddy dance, as it swept and swayed to the music,Dreamlike, with beaming eyes and the rush of fluttering garments.

Meanwhile, apart, at the head of the hall, the priest and the herdsmanSat, conversing together of past and present and future;While Evangeline stood like one entranced, for within herOlden memories rose, and loud in the midst of the music

Heard she the sound of the sea, and an irrepressible sadnessCame o’er her heart, and unseen she stole forth into the garden.Beautiful was the night. Behind the black wall of the forest,Tipping its summit with silver, arose the moon. On the riverFell here and there through the branches a tremulous gleam of the moonlight,Like the sweet thoughts of love on a dark- ened and devious spirit.Nearer and round about her, the manifold flowers of the gardenPoured out their souls in odors, that were their prayers and confessionsUnto the night, as it went its way, like a silent Carthusian.Fuller of fragrance than they, and as heavy with shadows and night-dews,Hung the heart of the maiden. The calm and the magical moonlightSeemed to inundate her soul with indefin- able longings,As, through the garden-gate, and beneath the shade of the oak-trees,Passed she along the path to the edge of the measureless prairie.Silent it lay, with a silvery haze upon it, and firefliesGleamed and floated away in mingled and infinite numbers.Over her head the stars, the thoughts of God in the heavens,Shone on the eyes of man, who had ceased to marvel and worship,Save when a blazing comet was seen on the walls of that temple,As if a hand had appeared and written upon them, “Upharsin.”And the soul of the maiden, between the stars and the fireflies,Wandered alone, and she cried, “O, Gabriel! O my beloved!Art thou so near unto me, and yet I cannot behold thee?

Art thou so near unto me, and yet thy voice does not reach me?Ah! How often they feet have trod this path to the prairie!Ah! How often thine eyes have looked on the woodlands around me!Ah! How often beneath this oak, returning from labor,Thou hast lain down to rest, and to dream of me in my slumbers!When shall these eyes behold, these arms be folded about thee?”Loud and sudden and near the roots of a whipporwill soundedLike a flute in the woods; and anon, through the neighboring thickets,Farther and farther away it floated and dropped into silence.“Patience!” whispered the oaks from orac- ular caverns of darkness:And, from the moonlit meadow, a sigh re- sponded, “Tomorrow!”

Bright rose the sun next day; and all the flowers of the gardenBathed in shining feet with their tears, and anointed his tressesWith the delicious balm that they bore in their vases of crystal.“Farewell!” said the priest, as he stood at the shadowy threshold;“See that you bring us the Prodigal Son from his fasting and famine,And, too, the Foolish Virgin, who slept when the bridegroom was coming.”“Farewell!” answered the maiden, and, smiling, with Basil descendedDown to the river’s brink, where the boat- men already were waiting.Thus beginning their journey with morn- ing, and sunshine, and gladness,Swiftly they followed the flight of him who was speeding before them,Blown by the blast of fate like a dead leaf over the desert.Not that day, nor the next, nor yet the day

that succeeded,Found they the trace of his course, in lake or forest or river,Nor, after many days, had they found him; but vague and uncertainRumors alone were their guides through a wild and desolate country;Till, at the little inn of the Spanish town of Adayes,Weary and worn, they alighted, and learned from the garrulous landlord,That on the day before, with horses and guides and companions,Gabriel left the village, and took the road of the prairies.

IVFar in the West there lies a desert land, where the mountainsLift, through the perpetual snows, their lofty and luminous summits.Down from their jagged, deep ravines, where the gorge, like a gateway,Opens a passage rude to the wheels of the emigrant’s wagon,Westward the Oregon flows and the Walle- way and Owyhee.Eastward, with devious course, among the Wind-river Mountains,Through the Sweet-water Valley precipi- tate leaps the Nebraska;And to the south, from Fontaine-qui-bout and the Spanish sierras,Fretted with sands and rocks, and swept by the wind of the desert,Numberless torrents, with ceaseless sound, descend to the ocean,Like the great chords of a harp, in loud and solemn vibrations.Spreading between these streams are the wondrous, beautiful prairies;Billowy bays of grass ever rolling in shadow and sunshine,Bright with luxuriant clusters of roses and purple amorphas.Over them wandered the buffalo herds, and

the elk and the roe-buck;Over them wandered the wolves, and herds of riderless horses;Fires that blast and blight, and winds that are weary with travel;Over them wander the scattered tribes of Ishmael’s children,Staining the desert with blood; and above their terrible war-trailsCircles and sails aloft, on pinions majestic, the vulture,Like the implacable soul of a chieftain slaughtered in battle,By invisible stairs ascending and scaling the heavens.Here and there rise groves from the margins of swift-running rivers;And the grim, taciturn bear, the anchorite monk of the desert,Climbs down their dark ravines to dig for roots by the brook-side,And over all its sky, the clear and crys- talline heaven,Like the protecting hand of God inverted above them.

Into this wonderful land, at the base of the Ozark Mountains,Gabriel far had entered, with hunters and trappers behind him.Day after day, with their Indian guides, the maiden and BasilFollowed his flying steps, and thought each day to o’ertake him.Sometimes they saw, or thought they saw, the smoke of his camp-fire,Rise in the morning air from the distant plain; but at nightfall,When they had reached the place, they found only embers and ashes.And, though their hearts were sad at times and their bodies were weary,Hope still guided them on, as the magic of Fata MorganaShowed them her lakes of light, then re- treated and vanished before them.

Once, as they sat by their evening fire, there silently enteredInto their little camp an Indian woman, whose featuresWore deep traces of sorrow, and patience as great as her sorrow.She was a Shawnee woman returning home to her people,From the far-off hunting-grounds of the cruel Comanches,Where her Canadian husband, a Coureur- des-Bois, had been murdered.Touched were their hearts at her story, and warmest and friendliest wel- comeGave they, with words of cheer, and she sat and feasted among themOn the buffalo-meat and the venison cooked on the embers.But when their meal was done, and Basil and all his companions,Worn with the long day’s march and the chase of the deer and the bison,Stretched themselves on the ground, and slept where the quivering fire-lightFlashed on their swarthy cheeks, and their forms wrapped up in their blankets,Then at the door of Evangeline’s tent she sat and repeatedSlowly, with soft, low voice, and the charm of her Indian accent,All the tale of love, with its pleasures, and pains, and reverses.Much Evangeline wept at the tale, and to know that anotherHapless heart like her own had loved and had been disappointed.Moved to the depths of her soul by pity and woman’s compassion,Yet in her sorrow pleased that one who had suffered was near her,She in turn related her love and all its dis- asters.Mute with wonder the Shawnee sat, and when she had endedStill was mute; but at length, as if a mys-

terious horrorPassed through her brain, she spake, and repeated the tale of the Mowis;Mowis, the bridegroom of snow, who won and wedded a maiden,But, when the morning came, arose and passed from the wigwam,Fading and melting away and dissolving into the sunshine,Till she beheld him no more, though she followed far into the forest.Then, in those sweet, low tones, that seemed like a weird incantation,Told she the tale of the fair Lilinau, who was wooed by a phantom,That through the pines o’er her father’s lodge, in the hush of the twilight,Breathed like the evening wind, and whis- pered love to the maiden,Till she followed his green and waving plume through the forest,And nevermore returned, nor was seen again by her people.Silent with wonder and strange surprise, Evangeline listenedTo the soft flow of her magical words, till the region around herSeemed like enchanted ground, and her swarthy guest the enchantress.Slowly over the tops of the Ozark Moun- tains the moon rose,Lighting the little tent, and with a mys- terious splendorTouching the somber leaves, and embracing and filling the woodland.With a delicious sound the brook rushed by, and the branchesSwayed and sighed overhead in scarcely audible whispers.Filled with the thoughts of love was Evan- geline’s heart, but a secret,Subtile sense crept in of pain and indefinite terror,As the cold, poisonous snake creeps into the nest of the swallow.It was no earthly fear. A breath from the

region of spiritsSeemed to float in the air of night; and she felt for a momentThat, like the Indian maid, she, too, was pursuing a phantom.With this thought she slept, and the fear and the phantom had vanished.

Early upon the morrow the march was resumed; and the ShawneeSaid, as they journeyed along, “On the western slope of these mountainsDwells in his little village the Black Robe chief of the Mission.Much he teaches the people, and tells them of Mary and Jesus.Loud laugh their hearts with joy, and weep with pain, as they hear him.”Then with a sudden and secret emotion, Evangeline answered,“Let us go to the Mission, for there good tidings await us!”Thither they turned their steeds; and be- hind a spur of the mountains,Just as the sun went down, they heard a murmur of voices,And in a meadow green and broad, by the bank of a river,Saw the tents of the Christians, the tents of the Jesuit Mission.Under a towering oak, that stood in the midst of the village,Knelt the Black Robe chief with his chil- dren. A crucifix fastenedHigh on the trunk of the tree, and over- shadowed by grapevines,Looked with its agonized face on the multu- tude kneeling beneath it.This was their rural chapel. Aloft, through the intricate archesOf its aerial roof, arose the chant of their vespers,Mingling its notes with the soft susurrus and sighs of the branches.Silent, with heads uncovered, the travelers, nearer approaching,

Knelt on the swarded floor, and joined in the evening devotions.But when the service was done, and the benediction had fallenForth from the hands of the priest, like seed from the hands of the sower,Slowly the reverend man advanced to the strangers, and bade themWelcome; and when they replied, he smiles with benignant expression,And, with rods of kindness, conducted them into his wigwam.There upon mats and skins they reposed, and on cakes of the maize-earFeasted, and slaked their thirst from the water-gourd of the teacher.Soon was their story told; and the priest with solemnity answered:--“Not six suns have risen and set since Gabriel, seatedOn this mat by my side, where now he maiden reposes,Told me this same sad tale; then arose and continued his journey!”Soft was the voice of the priest, and he spake with an accent of kindness;But on Evangeline’s heart fell his words as in winter the snow-flakesFall into some lone nest from which the birds have deported.“Far to the north he has gone,” continues the priest; “but in autumn,When the chase is done, will return again to the Mission.”Then Evangeline said, and her voice was meek and submissive,“Let me remain with thee, for my soul is sad and afflicted.”So seemed it wise and well unto all; and betimes on the morrow,Mounting his Mexican steed, with his Indian guides and companions,Homeward Basil returned, and Evangeline stayed at the Mission.

Slowly, slowly, slowly the days succeeded

each other,--Days and weeks and months; and the fields of maize that were springingGreen from the ground when a stranger she came, now waving above her,Lifted their slender shafts, with leaves interlacing, and formingCloisters for mendicant crows and granaries pillaged by squirrels.Then in the golden weather the maize was husked, and the maidensBlushed at each blood-red ear, for that be- tokened a lover,But at the crooked laughed, and called it a thief in the corn-field.Even the blood-red ear to Evangeline brought not her lover.“Patience!” the priest would say; “have faith, and they prayer will be an- swered!Look at this vigorous plant that lifts its head from the meadow,See how its leaves are turned to the north, as true as the magnet;This is the compass-flower, that the finger of God has plantedHere in the houseless wild, to direct the traveller’s journeyOver the sea-like, pathless, limitless waste of the desert.Such in the soul of man is faith. The blossoms of passion,Gay and luxuriant flowers, are brighter and fuller of fragrance,But they beguile us, and lead us astray, and their odor is deadly.Only this humble plant can guide us here, and hereafterCrown us with asphodel flowers, that are wet with the dews of nepenthe.”

So came the autumn, and passed, and the winter, -- yet Gabriel came not;Blossomed the opening spring, and the notes of the robin and bluebirdSounded sweet upon wold and in wood, yet

Gabriel came not.But on the breath of the summer winds a rumor was waftedSweeter than song of bird, or hue or odor of blossom.Far to the north and east, it said, in the Michigan forests,Gabriel had his lodge by the banks of the Saginaw River.And, with returning guides, that sought the lakes of St. Lawrence,Saying a sad farewell, Evangeline went from the Mission.When over weary ways, by long and peril- ous marches,She had attained at length the depths of the Michigan forests,Found she the hunter’s lodge deserted and fallen to ruin!

Thus did the long sad years glide on, and in seasons and placesDivers and distant far was seen the wan- dering maiden;--Now in the Tents of Grace of the meek Moravian Missions,Now in the noisy camps and the battle-fields of the army,Now in secluded hamlets, in towns and populous cities.Like a phantom she came, and passed away unremembered.Fair was she and young, when in hope began the long journey;Faded was she and old, when in disappoint- ment it ended.Each succeeding year stole something away from her beauty,Leaving behind it, broader and deeper, the gloom and the shadow.Then there appeared and spread faint streaks of gray o’er her forehead,Dawn of another life, that broke o’er her earthly horizon,As in the eastern sky the first faint streaks of the morning.

VIn that delightful land which is washed by the Delaware waters,Guarding in sylvan shades the name of Penn the apostle,Stands on the banks of its beautiful stream the city he founded.There all the air is balm, and the peach id the emblem of beauty,And the streets still reecho the names of the trees of the forest,As if they fain would appease the Dryads whose haunts they molested.There from the troubled sea had Evange- line landed, an exile,Finding among the children of Penn a home and a country.There old Rene Leblanc had died; and when he departed,Saw at his side only one of all his hundred descendants.Something at least there was in the friendly streets of the city,Something that spake to her heart, and made her no longer a stranger;And her ear was pleased with the Thee and Thou of the Quakers,For it recalled the past, the old Acadian country,Where all men were equal, and all were brothers and sisters.So, when the fruitless search, the disap- pointed endeavor,Ended, to recommence no more upon the earth, uncomplaining,Thither, as leaves to the light, were turned her thoughts and her footsteps.As from the mountain’s top the rainy mists of the morningRoll away, and afar we behold the land- scape below us,Sun-illumined, with shining rivers and cities and hamlets,So fell the mists from her mind, and she saw the world far below her,Dark no longer, but all illuminated with love;

and the pathwayWhich she had climbed so far, lying smooth and fair in the distance.Gabriel was not forgotten. Within her heart was his image,Clothed in the beauty of love and youth, as last she beheld him,Only more beautiful made by his death-like silence and absence.Into her thoughts of him time entered not, for it was not.Over him years had no power; he was not changed, but transfigured;He had become to her heart as one who is dead, and not absent;Patience and abnegation of self, and devo- tion to others,This was the lesson a life of trial and sor- row had taught her,So was her love diffused, but, like to some odorous spices,Suffered no waste nor loss, though filling the air with aroma.Other hope had she none, nor wish in life, but to followMeekly, with reverent steps, the sacred feet of her Saviour.Thus many years she lived as a Sister of Mercy; frequentingLonely and wretched roofs in the crowded lanes of the city,Where distress and want conceal them- selves from the sunlight,Where disease and sorrow in garrets lan- guished neglected.Night after night, when the world was asleep, as the watchman repeatedLoud, through the gusty streets, that all was well in the city,High at some lonely window he saw the light of her taper.Day after day, in the gray of the dawn, as slow through the suburbsPlodded the German farmer, with flowers and fruits for the market,Met he that meek, pale face, returning home

from its watchings.

Then it came to pass that a pestilence fell on the city,Presaged by wondrous signs, and mostly by flocks of wild pigeons,Darkened the sun in their flight, with naught in their craws but an acorn.And, as the tides of the sea arise in the month of September,Flooding some silver stream, till it spreads to a lake in the meadow,So death flooded life, and o’erflowing its natural margin,Spread to a brackish lake, the silver stream of existence.Wealth had no power to bribe, nor beauty to charm, the oppressor;But all perished alike beneath the scourge of his anger;--Only, alas! the poor, who had neither friends nor attendants,Crept away to die in the almshouse, home of the homeless.Then in the suburbs it stood, in the midst of meadows and woodlands;--Now the city surrounds it; but still, with its gateway and wicketMeek, in the midst of splendor, its humble walls seemed to echoSoftly the words of the Lord: “The poor ye always have with you.”Thither, by night and by day, came the Sister of Mercy. The dyingLooked up into her face, and thought, in- deed, to behold thereGleams of celestial light encircle her fore- head with splendor,Such as the artist paints o’er the brows of saints and apostles,Or such as hangs by night o’er a city seen at a distance.Unto their eyes it seemed the lamps of the city celestial,Into whose shining gates erelong their spirits would enter.

Thus, on a Sabbath morn, through the streets, deserted and silent,Wending her quiet way, she entered the door of the almshouse.Sweet on the summer air was the odor of flowers in the garden;And she paused on her way to gather the fairest among them,That the dying once more might rejoice in their fragrance and beauty.Then, as she mounted the stairs to the co- ridors, cooled by the east-wind,Distant and soft on her ear fell the chimes from the belfry of Christ Church,While, intermingled with these, across the meadows were waftedSounds of psalms, that were sung by the Swedes in their church at Wi- caco.Soft as descending wings fell the calm of the hour on her spirit:Something within her said, “At length thy trials are ended;”And, with light in her looks, she entered the chamber of sickness.Noiselessly moved about the assiduous, careful attendants,Moistening the feverish lip, and the aching brow, and in silenceClosing the sightless eyes of the dead, and concealing their faces,Where on their pallets they lay, like drifts of snow by the roadside.Many a languid head, upraised as Evange- line entered,Turned on its pillow of pain to gaze while she passed, for her presenceFell on their hearts like a ray of the sun on the walls of a prison.And, as she looked around, she saw how Death, the consoler,Laying his hand upon many a heart, had healed it forever.Many familiar forms had disappeared in the night time;Vacant their places were, or filled already

by strangers.

Suddenly, as if arrested by fear or a feel- ing of wonder,Still she stood, with her colorless lips apart, while a shudderRan through her frame, and, forgotten, the flowerets dropped from her fin- gers,And from her eyes and cheeks the light and bloom of the morning.Then there escaped from her lips a cry of such terrible anguish,That the dying heard it, and started up from their pillows.On the pallet before her was stretched the form of an old man.Long, and thin, and gray were the locks that shaded his temples;But, as he lay in the morning light, his face for a momentSeemed to assume once more the forms of its earlier manhood;So are wont to be changed the faces of those who are dying.Hot and red on his lips still burned the flush of the fever,As if life, like the Hebrew, with blood had besprinkled its portals,That the Angel of Death might see the sign, and pass over.Motionless, senseless, dying, he lay, and his spirit exhaustedSeemed to be sinking down through infi- nite depths in the darkness,Darkness of slumber and death, forever sinking and sinking.Then through those realms of shade, in mul- tiplied reverberations,Heard he that cry of pain, and through the hush that succeededWhispered in a gentle voice, in accents tender and saint-like,“Gabriel! O my beloved!” and died away into silence.Then he beheld, in a dream, once more the

home of his childhood,Green Acadian meadows, with sylvan rivers among them,Village, and mountain, and woodlands; and walking under their shadow,As in the days of her youth, Evangeline rose in his vision.Tears came into his eyes; and as slowly he lifted his eyelids,Vanished the vision away, but Evangeline knelt by his bedside.Vainly he strove to whisper her name, for the accents unutteredDied on his lips, and their motion revealed what his tongue would have spoken.Vainly he strove to rise; and Evangeline, kneeling beside him,Kissed his dying lips, and laid his head on her bosom.Sweet was the light of his eyes; but it sud- denly sank into darkness,As when a lamp is blown out by a gust of wind at a casement.

All was ended now, the hope, and the fear, and the sorrow,All was aching of heart, the restless, unsat- isfied longing,All the dull, deep pain, and constant an- guish of patience!And, as she pressed once more the lifeless head to her bosom,Meekly she bowed her own, and murmured, “Father, I thank thee!”

Still stands the forest primeval; but far away from its shadow,Side by side, in their nameless graves, the lovers are sleeping.Under the humble walls of the little Catho- lic churchyard,In the heart of the city, they lie, unknown and unnoticed.Daily the tides of life go ebbing and flow- ing beside them,Thousands of throbbing hearts, where

theirs are at rest and forever,Thousands of aching brains, where theirs no longer are busy,Thousands of toiling hands, where theirs have ceased from their labors,Thousands of weary feet, where theirs have completed their journey!

Still stands the forest primeval; but un- der the shade of its branchesDwells another race, with other customs and language.Only along the shore of the mournful and misty AtlanticLinger a few Acadian peasants, whose fa- thers from exileWandered back to their native land to die in its bosom.In the fisherman’s cot the wheel and the loom are still busy;Maidens still wear their Norman caps and their kirtles of homespun,And by the evening fire repeat Evangeline’s story,While from its rocky caverns the deep- voiced, neighboring oceanSpeaks, and in accents diconsolate answers the wail of the forest.